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Deja vu is the feeling you get when you believe that you're experiencing something that's happened to you before. For example, if you go to someplace for the very first time, you might get the sense that you've been there before. That's deja vu. The literal translation of deja vu is "already seen." Most people's initial response to the sensation of deja vu is to believe that they've dreamed about the place before. Although there are some more fantastical theories for the experiencing deja vu such as having visited somewhere in a "previous life."

Deja vu has been studied by psychologists and patients and people in normal everyday life for thousands of years. As well as believing that the repetition of familiarity in unfamiliar locations is due to dreams or past life experiences, some go even further and put it down to some kind of mystery known only to the Gods. Deja vu is experienced by most people; around 70 percent of the population reports having experienced deja vu at some stage. A higher number of incidents occurs in people aged between 15 and 25 years than in any other age group, which might explain why many theories are a little romanticized and fantastic (who, at the tender age of 15, wants to believe that there's a simple, rational explanation for something that feels so irrational?!).

While some of the theories about deja vu that abound sound exciting and mysterious, I am firmly in the camp that believes there's nothing "other worldly" about it. This theory might not be as exciting or as mysterious as some, but it's undoubtedly the common-sense one. It's also a lot easier to explain than some of the others! Deja vu occurs when the memory process goes a little off kilter, usually due to stress or tiredness. What usually happens when you see something is that the image goes through the eye first and then is committed to memory, a bit like taking a photograph and then filing it, in that order. However, with deja vu, that sequence gets "over-lapped." The first part of the process (the photograph part) is running a little slow and so the second part (the memory part) is able to happen that bit faster, so once the eye has seen something (taken its photo) and then goes to place it in the memory (the filing process), the memory says: "hang on, we've already got that." This usually happens when we're tired or stressed.

That's why you think you've seen something before, or experienced something before - it's just the time delay in the eye to memory sequence being affected. As I say, it's not a theory that's shrouded in mystery and enigma and it's in no way connected to other worldly events, but it's a simple theory for something that feels a whole lot "bigger" than it really is.

Learn more about this author, Jed Eane.
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